“ Dear Mr.Suzuki, I hereby send you a copy of a letter I recently sent to Mr.Goldstein regarding our human environment and the sciences in general. Perhaps it will be of interest to you: ------------------------------- Hi Lorrie, Some days I survive on bread (toasted) and coffee (insant). Oh, don't feel sorry for me. I don't mind. There are only so many hours in a day and when grocery shopping and food preparations get in the way, when on a day like today I like to try and properly formulate a thought in writing, I will gladly do without a home cooked meal. On days like that, when entering into a well stocked library, it feels like walking into a candy store. So many sweets for the mind to try and taste without having to be concerned about obesity! The other day I had found a very sweet piece of writing by Noam Chomsky, printed in The Journal of Philosophy, Vol CVI, No.4, April 2009 (if you get a spare moment I highly recommend you read it) entitled: The Mysteries of Nature: How deeply hidden? The write-up deals with an interesting topic, namely the deeper topic of how our consciousnes, our mind, fits into the wider workings of things being nature, but a lot of what Mr.Comsky writes about in that particular piece relates to how we, as social creatures, deal with phenomena. It could be considered that the debate about climate change falls into this catagory; such a phenomena it has become. (The ultimate endeavor interesting to me, would be to relate the existence of phenomena genrally speaking to the question of how matter and thinking is to be considered. "Locke on the possibility of thinking matter" is the other paper in front of me, but I will try and restict myself here to the existence of phenomena in relation to the climate change debate.) It is very difficult to separate one historic thought from another, I firmly believe that all is one and that placing thoughts in isolation is the root cause for futher confusion. Yet, it is impossible to write down entire thoughts because thoughts are ongoing; there is no end to them, we can't remember even where or when thoughts have started. And so all I can offer at any given time,is a piece of my mind. I do not wish to take sides in this debate. That does not mean that I think there are no necessary sides to take in this debate. There most certainly are. But what I am more interested in is to be able to fold my thoughts around the existing phenomena as such, thereby hoping to find not just the roots of entanglement leading us into this debate about climate change but also hoping to find a way for leading us out of this ongoing debate. For such a futile debate it has become. The climate change debate and what to do about it, is clearly stuck in a rut. I believe the debate is stuck in a rut because the underlying forces having led us to where we now stand (divided), must again be responsible for bringing both sides closer together. If we know where we've come from, we will know how to get there! History then, and more importantly "historic thoughts", must be considered. Within this climate change debate, it could be said that science acts as being both: being instigator and blocker. Science tells us we know so very much and science tells us we know so very little. The pursuit of science opens our eyes and it closes them. Simultaneously, it seems. And in that regard, Mr.Chomsky (The Mysteries of Nature: how deeply hidden?) brings forth some important historic quotations to consider. He writes: " Thomas Kuhn suggested that "It does not, I think, misrepresent Newton's intention as a scientist to maintain that he wished to write a principle of natural philosophy, like Descartes (that is, true science), but this his inability to explain gravity forced him to restrict his subject to the Mathematical Principles of Natural Phylosophy, which did not even pretend to explain why the universe runs as it does," leaving the question in obscurity. For such reason "it was 40 years before Newtonian physics firmly supplanted Cartesian physics, even in British universities" and some of the ablest physicists of the eithteenth century continued to seek a mechanical-corpuscular explanation of gravity - that is, what they took to be a physical explanation - as Newton did himself. In later years posivitists reproached all sides of the debates "for their foolishness in clothing the mathematical formalism (of physical theory) with the "gay garment" of a physical interpretation, "a concept that had lost substantive meaning." What to think of science then? What to think of science now? Chomsky continues:"Newton't famous phrase:"I frame no hypotheses" appears in this context: recognizing that he had been unable to discover the physical cause of gravity, he left the question open. He adds that "to us it is enough that gravity does really exist, and act according to the laws which we have explained, and abundantly serves to account for all the motions of the celestial bodies and of our sea." But while agreeing that his proposals were so absurd that no serious scientist could accept them, he defended himself from the charge that he was reverting to mysticism of the Aristotelians. His principles, he argued, were not occult:" their causes only are occult"; or he hoped, were yet to be discovered in physical terms, meaning mechanical terms. To derive general principles inductively from phenomena, he continued, "and afterwards to tell us how the properties of actions of all corporeal things follow from those manifest principles, would be a very great step in philosophy, though the causes of these principles were not yet discovered. To paraphrase with regard to the contemporary analogue I mentioned, it "would be a very great step in science to account for mental aspects of the world in terms of manifest priciples even if the causes of these principles were not yet discovered" - or to put the matter more appropriately, even if unification with other aspects of science had not been achieved. To learn more about mental aspects of the world - or chemical or electrical or other aspects - we should try to discover "manifest principles" that partially explain them, though their causes remain disconnected from what we take to be more fundamental aspect of science. The gap might have many reasons, among them, as has repeatedly been discovered, that the presumed reduction base was misconcieved, including core physics. Historians of science have recognized that Newton's reluctant intellectual moves set forth a new view of sicence in which the goal is not to seek ultimate explanations but to find the best theoretical account we can of the phenomena of experience and experiment. Newton's more limited goals were not entirely new. They have roots in an earlier scientific tradition that had abandoned the search for the "first springs of natural motions" and other natural phenomena, keeping to the more modest effort to develop the best theoretical account we can....." Such quotes seem to me to be entirely relevant today, especially when taken in climate-change-and-what-to-do-about-it context. What have we gotten ourselves into? Are we, as humans, even capable of understanding that there is such a "first spring of natural motions" in existence? It is noteworthy here to question also why the notion of God, whatever that notion may ential, is, in these modern times, so hotly debated likewise. If we have come to believe that the pursuit of science as decribed above, is indeed the norm (if we have accepted that the pursuit of science will open and close our eyes simultaneously) then the debate about the existence of a God at the same time is not by coincidence. The two topics fall clearly within the same guidelines: we have come to believe that we, as mankind, can truly stand in isolation. Mankind can be the cause of gobal warming! Mankind will be entirely capable of rectitying the effects of global warming! We are even trying to set the rise of climategate into such context. We may think that the stink surrounding climategate arises out of scientific endeavours playing fast and loose with data, or that such stink arises out of scientifice communities closing gates around them for idealogical reasons. However, climategate and the climate debate being stuck in a rut, relate much further back. Of course, in the meantime, Newton's era and the understanding thereof have been overlayed by the rise of quantum physics but quantum physics is, in essence, a renewed confused look into what Newton and his era could not grasp at the time. Newton acknowledged that there are limitations to our understanding and quatum physics has proven him to be right, at least, in that regard. The 'why' of things has, as of yet, not been answered. If the climate change debate and what to do about it, and if climate gate tell us anything, it is the fact that the pursuit of science as conducted in isolated form, can not help itself but to run into a wall. Precisely because scientific pursuit has mainly focused on coming to understand the mechanical workings of our universe, because within such terms it is possible for us to understand, thereby leaving the larger questions unanswered, they (those scientists) are in turn restricted by the very same isolating position they placed themselves into. In other words, when the larger picture forms to be a part of the debate on climate change, the narrowly focused scientific but mechanical theories, no longer can find the real solutions to the problem. In other words, it is the narrowness of scientific pursuit which keeps us locked down within this futility. More relevant questions will need to be asked and answered before we can go forward in any meaningful way. And those questions need to relate to the wider workings of an all encompassing 'why'. The 'why' of things are hidden deeper and are more difficult to understand, especially en masse. But reaching for solutions in isolated pursuit may do more harm then good. Al Gore and the likes may still be of the opinion that phenomena may come and go in a hurry, that they may turn on a dime, but so-called leaders are mistaken. Like George Jonas tells us when referring to other worldly events: "Obama's ideas, policies and desires, no matter how strong, are dwarfed by the weight and momentum of the vessel he commands. Buoyancy and gravity have ideas and desires of their own, and the wind and the waves obey no one. (America and Iran: Two imperatives, febr 17). And by George, he's right! (and then there's Locke on the possibility of thinking matter....) Are we, as mankind, collectively strong enough for sailing into safer harbours (for that's all mankind can ultimately aim for)? I don't know, yet I certainly hope so. But we will have to read many, many more books. Back to the candystore then! In the meantime Lorrie: tighten them sails; with the right winds blowing who knows: a safe harbour might come in sight. Regards, Francien Verhoeven

“ INTERESTING IDEA: It would be better if the comment letters would be displayed with spaces between the paragraphs, just like the sender would have intended it, and just like separate paragraphs exist within Mr.Suzuki's write-up, For easier reading.